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Topic: Switcheroo: Juno/Acero (Read 909 times)

He's going to run out of bombs at some point. Whatever that weapon is, munitions like that are limited. The incoming thrown projectiles were easy enough to avoid, as the young man dove to the side and took off, sprinting in an arc, stopping slightly closer to his opponent. The near constant sandstorm, however, was its own issue. Sight lines and incoming projectiles were obscured, and approaches became risky. Instinctively, Juno slid two fingers across his field of vision, only to curse himself silently as his visor didn't project over his eyes. Gods, what he would give to have Phi at his side...

Attempting to pick out his opponent through the temporary sandstorm, Juno readied his stance, easing his way over, on the balls of his feet as he readied himself for whatever may come next.

Not really knowing what to do in the sandstorm, Acero decided that he would keep his opponent from his weapon, and started to walk in the direction that he thought it was in. While walking, he thought about how much damage the first year had done to him, and how much better or worse it might've been if they were allowed to use their own gear/ semblances. These thoughts disappeared however when Acero tripped and fell over the ice covered rifle spear. After heavily sighing, Acero stood up in a combat ready stance, ready for the sandstorm to end, and for his opponent to come running at him.

As it seemed, his opponent had a similar idea in waiting him out. Such an exchange could definitely go on longer than necessary, with both combatants out of each other's effective ranges. Normally, the first one to move would just be asking to be countered, but Juno needed that spear. If he could just distract him...

Juno broke into a sprint toward his opponent, only to drop into a slide once he was in melee range, similarly to his previous uppercut. However, as he slid, he dragged his hand against the ground, subtly collecting sand left from the previous sandstorms. Once he shifted to the heel of his foot and stood up, he feinted the rising uppercut, only to throw the fistful of sand into his opponent's face, following the attempted distraction with a rough hook to his stomach, hoping to force him back.

Acero was completely caught off guard by the sand, and grunted in pain as it hit his right eye, though he could still see with his left eye. This allowed him to somewhat block the hook to his stomach, though it still forced him back. Wanting to try something out, Acero moved his right arm back about sixty degrees, he then moved his arm forward while firing a grappling hook at the same time, making it to wrap around his opponents left leg.

"Get over here!" he shouted as he started to reel the grappling hook back, hoping to stomp the first year once he was in range.

The gauntlet had a grappling hook. Of course the gauntlet had a grappling hook. Juno didn't have time to react when he was suddenly swept off of his feet, colliding with the ground flat on his back. As if that wasn't enough, he was then dragged a short distance across the ground, only to have his momentum stopped when his opponent slammed his heel into Juno's chest.

That... Was a wake up call if Juno had ever had one. Nevertheless, Juno refused to stay down, grabbing his opponent's legs at the back of the knee and pushing, trying to force his opponent to fall over as he attempted to scramble to his feet.

Juno grimaced as both of Acero's feet impacted his stomach, launching him roughly a foot back and knocking the wind out of him as he collided into the ground. Acero was strong, there was no questioning that. Granted, it was to be expected. The man was a 4th year, after all. Catching his breath as he rolled over, Juno grew puzzled as his hand brushed against something cold and... dripping? A glance at his hand prompted a grin to break across Juno's face, as he was back in possession of Vermilion's rifle. Couple of scrapes on the casing, little water damage... the weapon was still in good enough shape for use, and use it he would.

Snatching the gun from the ground, Juno jumped back, hoping to make some distance between him and Acero before drawing the bolt back, leveling the gun at mid chest level, and firing, only realizing after he pulled the trigger that he hadn't accounted for ammo drop or recoil. At the very least, he still had distance between him and his opponent. He could recover in the time needed to close the gap.

As Acero reached for a bomb in the bag on the left side of his body, a shot from Juno's rifle went straight through it, causing the dust particles from all of them to become unstable, causing a sizable explosion to occur at Acero's waist, sending him flying to one side of the arena, hitting a wall. The blast blew Acero's prosthetic arm clean off, damaged his lower jaw and face, and severely damaged the 4th years torso and left leg. The 4th year was knocked unconscious as he hit the wall, his charred body laying there.

Juno paused as his opponent erupted into an explosion of fire and lightning, the shockwave ripping the gun from his hands and forcing him to stagger. It took a moment for him to recover, but once he looked up, his face fell. Acero's body was smoking and burned, his prosthetics destroyed and Sandy's weapons likely in pieces. That explosion couldn't have been much worse than the one in the semifinals, right? Acero actually used some of his grenades. Granted, he didn't know the yield on those things...

The young man glanced up at the stands before darting toward his opponent's crumpled form, praying to the gods that the 4th year was still alive. A sigh of relief escaped his lips as he saw Acero's chest rise and fall, but he was definitely going to have scars. And probably hate him for the rest of his career, if he could even continue at that point. The fact of the matter was, Juno fucked up. This was his fault. If he had just accounted for the gun... "Is there a medical team on standby? He needs help!" Juno shouted, hoping that the teacher's assistant could hear him as he remained by the fourth year.

Malina stepped off of the final stair leading back down to the arena as the explosion rocked the stadium. She stole a quick glance toward the belt before quickly burst through the door, looking around only to see the smoking body of one of the students and the other, Juno, standing over him.

"Oh, for..." She muttered under her breath before dropping the belt to the ground and sprinting toward the two students. This wasn't how it was supposed to go. This was *not* how it was supposed to go. It was just a training exercise in an open space, an open space with plenty of people around watching.

Juno watched as Malina came sprinting toward him, happy that she'd heard his cries for assistance. This was still bad, so very bad, but the she was here, she would be able to take care of him. She's a hunter, she knows what to d-

Before Juno could finish the though he felt the air being knocked out of his chest as some invisible force slammed against him, sending him flying away from Acero and against a wall.

Malina quickly took the place where Juno had stood as she slowed to a stop from her sprint and bent down over Acero. "Son of a bitch..." She swore under her breath as she looked over the damage. The crumpled metal arm laying in pieces to the side, frayed wiring and tubes hanging from both ends like robotic entrails. The burns covering his face and chest, the clothing that had previously covered him burned away or melded with the skin. Blood seeped from his leg and trickled down the side of his chest as his chest slowly rose and fell, bringing with it ragged and labored breaths. She looked down to his hip where the bag of bombs had been and found nothing but a bloody chunk and blasted away fabric.

"I... I could try to wrap some of the fabric around the wound, but... There's too many spots, I can't..." She swore under her breath again before reaching into her pocket and pulling out her scroll. She quickly opened the device and furiously tapped a number in. "Come on, come on, pick u- oh! Sophea! It's Malina... Malina Nahualli, the new TA- it doesn't matter- look, I need you to get to Amity as soon as you can, the training exercise that was planned today went wrong, one of the students is badly injur-... Ah... burns? He's bleeding from the leg and chest, his prosthetic arm is just gone... it was a-... it was an explosion, I think, dust bombs on his his hip in a bag, they-... they went off, yes. Okay... alright, I'll see you soon." Malina closed her scroll and placed tossed it to the ground, not bothering to put it back in her pocket.

She stood up quickly and unbuttoned her shirt, leaving her with the simple white undershirt she had been wearing. She crouched back down and placed the shirt against Acero's hip, using the sleeves to tightly wrap it around his leg. She watched as the previously white shirt began to spread red with blood as she wiped her own now bloody hands against her shirt. She looked once more at the broken prosthetic and winced, wondering how advanced the nerve system had been set up before shaking her head and refocusing herself. With a silent sigh, she moved toward Acero's head and elevated it slightly with her hands.

She took a moment, just a moment, to glance over at Juno, who was not recovering from being slammed against the wall from her semblance. She made sure to lock eyes with him, but she showed no emotion, no hate, no sympathy, just vague judgement.

Walking out of the tunnels and onto the playing field was always fascinating experience, except of course if it were her and her peers doing the walking: then it was unfortunate at best and tragic at worst. Sophea lead the way, covered in scrubs with her hair tied up into a bun. She reached into her red duffel bad and pulled out two disposable gloves, putting each on with a nice snap, making sure to not embarrassingly tear them by mistake. Her eyes scanned the arena, quickly identifying Malina and the burn victim. She gestured toward the two following her, who were managing the stretcher, and pointed in Malina's direction.

Arriving, she placed the medical bag on the ground and quickly got to work. "Alright, Malima. We'll take it from here." She replaced Malina's hands with some padding, making sure to minimize disturbance on Acero's head. She quickly checked for consciousness, but it was clear to everyone around that he was completely out. Sophea quickly moved on to delegating tasks. "Clean and seal this wound as best you can," she told one medic as she glanced over Acero's body. The medic pulled out a significant number of pads, clearing the area off blood as best she could before finishing off with a spray of alcohol; a lack of a response from Acero again demonstrated the depth of his unconsciousness. She almost told the other medic to take care of his arm before remembering that a prosthetic once was where there was now a void, instead telling him, "Start working on the most severe burns first then move on to the other damaged areas. I'm going to run a quick diagnostic on him." He nodded and started clearing Acero's clothes from his various burn areas before clearing away blood, disinfecting the areas, and dressing them with bandages.

Meanwhile, Sophea placed the blunt end of a needle against some undamaged skin that was closest to ground zero and concentrated, and what she could feel was more or less what she was expected: to put it simply, it was clear that his body was in Defcon 1. She concentrated harder, sweeping away as much of the noise as she could, and she found something she hoped wasn't the case. "Femoral artery damage, but I'm unsure of the severity; because of the extent of the damage, there's just too much noise to get a clear picture. Finish up. We need to go. Now." The two medics nodded in unison and finished as quickly and cleanly as they could before they loaded Acero onto the stretcher and made their way to where they had just entered. Sophea called back to Malina. "If you'd like to join us, feel free! Otherwise, meet us there later. We're getting an incident report wither way."

She set her head back to facing the exit and made sure to keep the wound under pressure, specifically above the location of the artery damage she had perceived earlier. She unclasped her radio from her waist, sending in a call to prepare for surgery in regards to third-degree burns on a significant portion of the victim's body, jaw damage, a severe skin laceration, and femoral arterial damage. Receiving an acknowledgement, she replaced the radio on her waist. "This...is going to be a long night."

Malina gave Sophea a wry smile as she began to walk away. "No, no. I need to take care of the other kids here. Thanks though." She quietly said before turning back to where the boy had been laying, a red stain now stuck to the metal floor until the janitorial staff could get there. She sighed and looked down at her once white shirt, now mostly bloody red with streaks of white where the blood fortunately hadn't gotten on her. She lifted her head back up away from the bloody shirt and looked around the arena, first to Juno who still sat where she'd launched him, and then to Phi who still laid right where she'd dropped her. She took one more look up into the stands at the crowd of students and civilians who had gathered around before she turned and made her way back toward the belt.

"I-" She started before being cut of with a "No words." and promptly shut up as Malina picked her up. "We will have plenty of time to talk, I can promise that." The girl said, turning around to walk back toward Juno with belt in hands. "Later." She kept a solemn expression plastered on her face as she made her way to the boy. As she approached she tried to make out his face, but it was just a defeated shocked child. He hadn't meant to do anything, but... but that didn't mean she could go easy on him.

"I-" He started before having his belt thrust into his arms, cutting him off. "No. Words." Malina said as she leaned in, getting almost too close to the young student's face. "You'll talk with me in my office, both of you..." She gestured down toward the belt. "Individually. Later. For now, get back with the rest of the class, we're going back to Beacon." And with that, she back away from his face and moved past him, toward a set of stairs leading to the stands, heading back toward where the students had been watching down from.